Our series of NASCAR driver interviews continues this week with Parker Kligerman, who drives for Kyle Busch Motorsports in the Nationwide Series but will make his Sprint Cup Series debut with Swan Racing at Texas Motor Speedway on Sunday.

Q: From what you can tell, whose driving style is the most similar to yours?

A: I've had a lot of experience working with other drivers – obviously being at Penske Racing for four years, I saw how Kurt (Busch) drove and I also got to see how Brad (Keselowski) drove. I always kind of prided myself on being able to change my style.

When I was working with Brad, I noticed he had a very unique style of when he lifted (off the gas) and braked compared to other drivers, and it was really in an effort to allow the car to settle as much as possible into the corner. So I was actually able to try imitating his style and copy it, and I found that I could go back and forth between that and my own style -- which was a lot like Kurt's – at the drop of a hat.

I've tried continuing to evolve that to where you find yourself doing whatever it takes to be successful that weekend and have a different set of weapons in your arsenal, so to speak.

Q: Do you collect any of your own racing memorabilia? Do you keep things like firesuits, helmets and diecast cars?

A: I never did. I'm sure my mom kept some stuff from my first few years of racing and go-karting somewhere in our house. But I was a little bit ignorant and brash when I first got (to stock cars) and my thinking was along the lines of, "If I'm thinking about keeping that stuff then I'm not focused on the future and succeeding." So I never really kept anything.

But I guess over the last year or two since I left Penske and was at a couple different teams, I've started to collect a couple things. Especially the Penske stuff – it's not every day you realize you were 18 years old and working for Roger Penske. So that was a cool thing. It means a lot to be able to keep a suit or helmet from different teams and have those memories down the road. You never know: One day you might want to create a trophy room or something like that.

The one thing is I've always made sure to keep checkered flags. I don't keep trophies – I've never been a big fan of trophies. But I love checkered flags. No matter if you won a go-kart race or the Daytona 500, I think they symbolize the end goal. You should work hard for each one. I have all of those in my house.

What did you do with all the trophies you didn't keep?

I give them away to the people who made it happen. Whether it's a sponsor or the owner or someone in my family that might want it.

There's only one trophy I ever won that I'd like to get back – and I'll try to get it back at some point – and that was the Tim Richmond Memorial 200 trophy from ARCA that I won in Ohio (in 2009). It was pretty cool to win something with his name on it.

Q: What percent of overall success in NASCAR has to do with the driver, what percent is the car and what percent is luck?

A: I've read that question a lot from all the drivers you've asked, and this is completely impartial, but I thought the best answer was from Kyle Busch (his team owner, who said it was 50% car, 35% driver and 15% luck). I thought that was an accurate idea of what it really takes.

The funny thing about that question is the weight of the driver side can be very large depending on how good the driver is. If you have a perfect car but your driver is not a very good driver, then that percentage becomes a lot larger. If you take Kyle Busch and put him in a Front Row Motorsports car – no offense to them – you're not going to go win races. So there's obviously a balance to find, but in general terms if everyone was on a level playing field, it would be 60% car, 30% driver and 10% luck.

Q: What person outside of your family has done the most for your racing career?

But outside of my family, I'd say Briggs Cunningham and Cunningham Motorsports (ARCA team), they were really instrumental at the start of my career. And then Roger Penske and a lot of the supporters I've had in recent years in terms of sponsorship – like Bandit Chippers and North American Power – they all add up to being very much a part of the equation.

A lot of times as a young driver – especially in the Nationwide and Truck Series – to have a sponsor or to have an entity that is really behind you and follows you is doing more for your career than you could ever ask for, because at the end of the day, they make it possible for you to get in the race car and show what you can do.

People want to harken back to the days when a driver just showed up with a helmet and raced, but that's kind of going away. A big part of that is having sponsors or other supporters out there who can help you get in the race car. For young drivers right now, that's bigger than anything.

Parker Kligerman says he wishes he'd saved more of his helmets and firesuits from his time with Team Penske.(Photo: Matthew OHaren, USA TODAY Sports)

Q: You come into contact with a lot of people during a given race weekend -- your team, sponsors, media, fans. With all those demands on your time, how do you decide how to divide it up?

A: I always work with my PR guy before the weekend to look at things. Obviously, the performance of the race car is very important, so we need to do what's necessary on that end. That would come first, then anything we need to do for the sponsors is next.

And then sadly – and this isn't to put them last -- it's the fans. But we try to do a lot of things with the fans through our sponsors, so hopefully we can do both at once.

If I'm walking to the qualifying line and people ask me for autographs, my biggest thing is just know my name. If you say, "Hey, driver" then I'm not stopping. That's my new thing. I used to stop for everything and everyone and I realized it was getting too crazy.

So if you know my name and say it, I will stop. But if you just say "driver" or "dude," I'm not stopping.

Q: I've often heard fans say something to drivers like, "Remember me from that autograph session three years ago?" That's hard to do, but it shows you fans want to be remembered. So if someone really wants to be remembered by you, what is something he or she could do?

A: I agree with some of the other drivers who have answered this question and said the biggest thing is having a story that makes a connection or if someone is a repeat and you see them a lot at different tracks.

I had one girl who, after I won the pole at Iowa last year, wrote her number on my hand. So I thought that was pretty funny and I remembered that.

The stories they tell you and the interactions you build helps make it more than just a fan-to-driver relationship -- they become someone who is part of the race weekend. So any story or interaction usually jogs my memory.

There are times, though – and I feel bad – that I might have talked to someone and my mind might have been in two different places at once. So if I see them six months later, I couldn't tell you I've met them before. But I think most fans nowadays understand we're getting pulled in so many different directions and have so much going on that even when you're talking to us and we're into the conversation, our minds might be in 72 different places at that time alone.

Q: The last person you wrecked – did you do it on purpose?

A: You know, I'd never really wrecked somebody on purpose until this year. In most of my racing, I always raced with the golden rule of treating others how I'd want to be raced. But I found that in a 33-race season, there are some people you keep racing each weekend and wouldn't change their style and eventually it may have affected your finishes so often that you had to make a statement. And that's when I wrecked someone for the first time intentionally.

And at the road course this year, I got hit by the same person so many times that I let them have it.

It takes a lot to drive me to that point and I don't feel proud about it later. I don't feel proud about damaging their race car. The driver is reaping what he sows, but I know what kind of effort the team guys put in at the shop and the time and money it takes to build these race cars, so I don't like to go out there and do that. But sometimes you're given no choice.

The road course one you can figure out. He's Australian. And then the other one, I'll leave it be. They know who they are. (Editor's note: Australian Marcos Ambrose said in his 12 Questions interview this year that he wrecked Kligerman on purpose and would do it again.)

Q: Is there anyone you used to clash with, but over time things thawed out and now you get along or are even friends?

A: I've had that happen a couple times, where at first you didn't get along for whatever reason or even didn't like each other before you met each other. That's the competitive side of being a race car driver.

The one that comes to mind is Austin Dillon. We've actually become really good friends the last few months of the season and I've even gotten to be friends with his team and his crew chief, Danny Stockman. We didn't always get along the best, especially in 2011. In 2012, we didn't even have a relationship.

But throughout this season, we've always raced each other cleanly and had good races together. We've found that we have things in common to talk about, and before you knew it, I felt like he was someone I'd consider a friend.

Q: What's the best racing-related movie?

A: Now it's Rush. But before that, I would have said Le Mans or maybe Grand Prix. I know everyone says Days of Thunder, and I love Days of Thunder, but it's really not the best racing-related movie. It's the best NASCAR-related movie for sure, but it's not the best overall racing movie.

Q: What's your song of the moment right now?

A: I don't usually pick one song. I'm a huge music fanatic and a huge Drake fan. He just released his new album and I've been jamming out to that a lot. I was supposed to go see Taking Back Sunday this weekend, actually, but I'm doing my first Cup start now so I can't go to the concert. But I've been listening to a lot of their music as well.

Do you have any favorite songs from the new Drake album?

The ones I really liked are Worst Behavior and Tuscan Leather.

Q: Define yourself without NASCAR. Who are you away from the track?

A: That was always a really tough question for me the last few years and especially growing up, because I was so focused on racing. I kind of realized I didn't have anything away from racing. I was just a driver.

But without racing, I don't know where I'd be. I look at where my best friends from home (in Connecticut) are at in their lives, and they're all just out of college and entering into jobs in New York City. I'd say I'm just a normal 22-year-old kid trying to figure it all out and trying to make his mark in the world and trying to be successful doing it.

I don't think there's anything that defines me because I'm pretty open-minded and I like to do a lot of things, but at the end of the day, my focus continues to be on racing and on trying to be a champion. I don't leave much time for anything else.

Q: I've been asking each driver to give me a question for the next interview. Last week was Kenny Wallace, and he wanted to know: Which Cup driver do you find to be the most intriguing person in the garage?

A: The most interesting one I guess from the outside – and I guess the fans feel this way as well – is Dale (Earnhardt) Jr. He's a real interesting person in terms of what he's dealt with his whole life and the fame and the pressure he's under. He's been able to handle the pressure, plus the amount of support he gets and the amount of people who know him.

But I don't think drivers are necessarily the most interesting people in the garage. A lot of the owners out there are really, really interesting people who have done a tremendous amount in the world. They don't seem to get that much press for it, and I think they enjoy being under the radar.

Many of the owners are very interesting and intellectual people. The owner I'm driving for this weekend, Brandon Davis, is one of them. He's very young and very successful (Davis owns an independent energy company), and you wonder how those guys accomplished all they did outside of racing and how they want to now be successful in another endeavor as well. I think that's a really interesting concept.

And do you have a question for the next person?

If it's an older driver, it would just be "What's the hardest obstacle you had to fight to get to the Sprint Cup Series?" And if it's a younger driver, it would be, "What is the biggest obstacle you've faced so far in your quest to get to the Cup Series?"

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PARKER KLIGERMAN'S THREE FAVORITE APPS

I'm the worst at apps there is. Everyone always has an app for something and is organized through their assorted apps, but I am the most random app downloader ever. I never seem to have anything I can stick with for more than a week.

-- Twitter. Twitter always comes first; it's the essential app.

-- Bank of America. That app is really important, because I'm juggling money and moving things and you can deposit checks in it. That's great.

-- Spotify. It's the music app where you can pay $10 and listen to any music there is and type it in and find it, and it also has a radio portion like Pandora. I use that a lot.